To not understand claims that life admin is 'not a thing'

[LabradorsInThePond]

I keep reading this on MN threads about organisation, time management etc. And that the life admin tasks of renewing insurances and checking mortgage rates can't take up that much time. But I spend a huge amount of time in the throes of life admin. We live a pretty normal, busy family life. I work 4 days in a professional role and can easily spend the 5th day (or at least half of it) in the throes of dreaded life admin.

My list tomorrow extends to twenty three separate items. None of which involve renewing insurances, but they do include buying clothing items (Scout shirt etc.), paying instrument hire, photocopying medical reports for school, booking airport parking, collecting worming tablets, booking a restaurant, buying zoo tickets, arranging a delivery of flowers for mum's birthday, an online grocery shop, buying a thank you gift, arranging a birthday party, booking a roofer, buying new windscreen wipers, emailing the GP, updating kids' Nimbl cards, finding a way to teach DS about dividing decimals, paying various people online etc.

None of these are yearly tasks, and next week there will be another 23 items to complete. It is relentless. DH does most of the house and long-term financial admin and he's also executing his father's too-complicated will, which makes my 23 items look like peanuts.

Do we just have an over-committed life, or does anyone one else find (what others consider non-existent) life admin burdensome and time-consuming? What am I doing wrong here?

Actually, my job has tons of aspects that are very similar to these tasks - things that don't feature in the job description and aren't given any value but still need doing nonetheless.

It's all just stuff that needs doing.

This 🤣🤣

I agree, it’s just part of life.

I know some people that get really stressed out by it but I never have. I quite like doing lots of the things on your list, buying clothes for my children, planning parties, buying presents, booking tickets to somewhere we want to go are all quite nice. Some people get stressed out and overwhelmed easier than others or by different things I suppose. To me, long as everyone is healthy and happy, I’m happy to do the boring stuff and it doesn’t seem to take up too much time if you just do a bit at a time. So much stuff can be done online now as well which helps.

It is unendurable and eats up my entire life. Nothing gets done or gets done and then, well blow me down, it has to be done AGAIN the next month!
Also, I've got ADHD.
Fun, fun, fun!

Im like you I tend to save it all up for the weekend. But I find crossing jobs off the list VERY satisfying.

A lot if those things can be done in a spare few mins at work or chilling on the settee in evening.

I booked a restaurant while waiting for a client to show up at work this morning, and after I've finished my sandwich I'm going to email someone to book an appointment.

I agree some life admin can pile up. I think people claim its not a thing is when on threads about house wives who explain what they do if they dont work, they list life admin as something that keeps them busy, I saw one saying managing their mortgage as a duty of theirs that justifies them not working.

(FYI I don't believe anyone has to justify not working, if you enjoy it and it works for you and how you like to live your life fine. It just looks a tad silly saying life admin keeps you so busy).

I think the people who 'don't get' life admin, must do absolutely nothing with their lives.
Just work and then stay at home.
So, to cherry pick from your list - they don't go on holiday so no airport booking, their dc don't do scouts so no uniform to buy etc etc etc for every single thing that is life admin.

I am much better at keeping in top of life admin ( which is definitely a thing) as I've had to up my game working almost full time and with kids.

The point I think people miss is the lack of down time. If you are constantly fitting in these little jobs into gaps you never get a break. I like to watch the birds/ garden whilst the kettle boils. These gaps are for me when my deeper thinking occurs - processing the morning etc, reflecting on a work problem. They are often little eureka moments which I resent missing.

Looking at my peer group I also see most of the life admin crammed into the day is done by women and we wander why we are frazzled?!

Does anyone remember the poster who bemoaned the mental load of organising family photographs 😂?

Well, yes @linerforlife
5 minute jobs. But there's 23 of them. 2 hours.

Or maybe just get on with it without making a fuss. My children do clubs most evening, we have a holiday booked, we both have jobs, we have our own hobbies. Life is far too short to allocate a day to paying people, buying things and booking things. Just sort it as it comes up.

I fit in 2-3 life admin jobs of a lunchtime at work - or get in early and tackle on my phone without helpful assistance from teenagers that cannot find xyz

I try and get one task done in my lunch hour at work.

this week I did:

ds’ passport application form - Monday
party rsvp’s - Tuesday
paid various builder invoices - Wednesday
got a refund on voucher for closed restaurant - today.

I think you should try to do these tasks piecemeal throughout your working week and spend your day off lying on the sofa and reading novels.

Else your whole life is going to feel like one big chore. Not nice.

I agree OP but I am not a super organised person . Adult DS has just been diagnosed with ADHD and I sort out his stuff too and it does take time . My work is such that I need my lunch break and don’t want to spend it doing home related stuff .

Those are big jobs which take time. But how often do you remortgage, every 2 years at the most? How often do you do major renovations necessitating negotiating with builders? How many times is your child going to start reception? No one expects you to do those jobs in 5 minutes but equally they are not jobs you have to do every week or even every year.

I have shelves loads of family photos. They've been there for years. They are a weight on my mind. I completely empathise.

I find life admin relentless too op. I recently had my car oranges from behind and there was so much time involved in the whole thing as it was deemed a write off so had to choose change of car blah blah. I always try to deal with everything as soon as possible too. There is always flipping something!

Until MN I never heard the phrase life admin. It was just life.
Buying clothes for school or scouts, organising a birthday gift etc we’re just tasks that got done as and when.
I certainly never counted them.

My car was pranged. Not oranges WTF!

Some of those jobs can be combined.
Eg a thank you gift and grocery shop or the wipers and thank you gift or the various people who need paying.
Many of them are under 5 minutes eg buying the scout top

I am a single parent of 3 and I don't spend a whole day on life admin. I prefer doing a bit every day rather than all in one go

Most people just crack on and do things without having to compartmentalise them and then give it a title

I agree. My DC's are in their 30's now. I was a single mum with no family help either, so I did literally everything. I didn't think of it as "mental load" it was just life! We all have "stuff" to do. In fact thinking back there were no mobiles or internet shopping when mine were small so it was a lot more work! (I'm aware how old that makes me sound!). It's easier now to fit in 5 minute admin jobs here and there.

If I left my house to get messy it might take me a day to clean. If I saved up all the laundry that'd be another chunk of day devoted to laundry (though even that you wouldn't just sit there by the washing machine you can do other things). I'm not saving up little tasks and then wasting half my non work day doing them.

I do this stuff online and takes very little time. I do it when I get reminder. I often email myself a reminder.

So text from music teacher about the term's lessons, pay immediately and thats a minute. Son says "I need a new scout shirt", that's another 2 mins. Online shop I do when eating my breakfast or before going to bed. Booking a roofer would take me longer. Probably call a few people or ask around for recommendations then you've got to get them round and chase them up if they don't come. I'm dealing with one right now, very much a one off and not taking significant amounts of my time or brain space.

Suggest getting off mumsnet and doing the odd task here and there, reclaim your day off.

Hmm, I do lots of stuff in and around my day job but with three kids and an old falling down victorian terrace, life admin does add up. It's a bit of a first world problem I agree with booking holidays and trips and outings etc but we do like to do them and so they generally need to be booked reasonably far in advance to manage the cost/timing.

And while some of them can be 'one offs' there are a reasonable number of them and they can really add up in terms of time impact. So we are doing some building work so need to speak to builder/review quote/query quote/discuss with bathroom planner which starts a whole new speak to builder phase!

Recent leaking water meter involved about 3 hours in total on hold to Thames Water (which I couldn't have fitted around my day job) and while I can get on with some stuff while on hold it is a bit of a time suck. that doesn't count the time actually talking to them on the phone or to the engineers who came round.

Agree that all the price comparison stuff makes you feel like you're missing out or wasting money if you don't shop around. I tend to pick one thing a year to do a comparison on (assuming the renewal isn't extortionate).

TBH it's part of the reason why I'm not going back to work full time yet as otherwise every evening or half a day at the weekend would be full of this crap and everything would move a lot more slowly. Maybe that wouldn't be the worst thing in the world...

I think I missed a trick by not having the sort of job in which I get an hour for lunch to sort out jobs. I am genuinely envious of those of you who do. That's five extra hours a week (so over half a day) in a full time job, in which to get stuff done.

I sometimes go for a short walk or drive at lunch, if I have a bit of time between meetings or patients, or need to clear my head, but couldn't do my job if I had a head full of home admin tasks, on top of the million work admin tasks and emotional containment I seem to do a lot of. Maybe that extra lunch time makes a big difference?

I agree that I really don't want life to feel like one big chore. It does feel exactly that way sometimes (except I'm lucky that I don't have to do this stuff on weekends).